


No Matter How Improbable

by NimbusLlewelyn



Category: Sherlock (TV), The Dresden Files - Jim Butcher
Genre: Any meeting will Not End Well, Beginning of something more?, Detectives, Gen, I wrote this ages ago, John Watson Makes Deductions, Mystery, Odds of Murphy killing Sherlock: high, Old Idea That Never Went Anywhere, Past Character Death, Post-Book 12: Changes, Sherlock (TV) Season/Series 01, Sherlock Holmes Makes Deductions, Short One Shot, Temporary Character Death, This fic has an unclear future
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-03-14
Updated: 2020-03-14
Packaged: 2021-02-28 22:22:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,651
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23144620
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NimbusLlewelyn/pseuds/NimbusLlewelyn
Summary: Few things interest Sherlock Holmes more than an unusual murder, preferably one unsolvable by conventional means. An unusual and unsolved murder where the victim - a self-proclaimed 'professional wizard' - promptly returned from the dead a year later, against all logic and forensic evidence, however, might just be one of them. Spoilers for 'Changes', naturally.
Comments: 18
Kudos: 60





	No Matter How Improbable

**Author's Note:**

> So, I got the idea for this about four years ago after rewatching 'A Study in Pink', wrote it down, shared it with a few friends, and was surprised at the positive response it received. My muse hopped back to my other stories, including my gargantuan main project (which I keep meaning to import in full from FF dot Net), and I never touched it again. Now, having touched it up slightly, I decided it was worth posting. 
> 
> I am open to doing more with this, but I don't know if I will.

John walked in to 221B and found Sherlock staring ferociously at a board of photographs, marked maps and printed off newspaper articles. Since this wasn't especially unusual, he made his way into the kitchen, saying, "You're back then. Want some tea?"

"No," Sherlock said, without looking up. Again, this was not an unusual response, even when Sherlock had been abroad for a week, so John made his tea and ambled over to the board, examining the photos. Most of them were CCTV images and seemed to depict a tall man in a long black coat, carrying what could only be called a staff since it was far too long to be a walking stick. Others were of the blood spattered deck of a small boat, and John could tell at a glance that no one could lose that amount of blood and live, not without an immediate transfusion.

"Who's this?" he asked.

"His name was Harry Dresden," Sherlock said, still not looking up. "Son of Malcolm Dresden, a travelling magician, and Margaret Dresden, no known occupation. Mother died in childbirth, father of an aneurysm at the age of 6. In foster care until 11, adopted by a Justin du Morne until he was 16 when a house fire apparently killed du Morne and Dresden's foster sister, Elaine Mallory."

"Apparently?" 

"Du Morne's body was found in the ruins, Mallory's was not. Dresden vanished for three years, then reappeared in Chicago as an apprentice private detective and a 'professional wizard'."

"I'm sorry, what?" John asked, a touch incredulous. "A wizard? A wizard called Harry?"

Sherlock's left hand flicked up, holding a business card. John took it and read, 'Harry Dresden, Wizard. Lost items found, paranormal consulting, advice, reasonable rates. No love potions, endless purses, parties or other entertainment.'

"You can't be serious," John said. "Why are you interested in him?"

"He was," Sherlock said.

"I'm sorry?"

"Look at the card, John. No bombast, no flair, no wild claims. It's businesslike and practical, the card of someone who is used to being mocked and disbelieved and as a result wants to be taken seriously," Sherlock said. "Other evidence backs that up: he was frequently associated with John Marcone, the senior figure in Chicago's underworld, as well as a significant number of suspicious deaths, including four FBI Agents, on Marcone's property after a series of werewolf-themed murders dubbed 'the Lobo Killings'. This led to speculation that he was a hitman with a gimmick. However, he was also repeatedly employed by an arm of the Chicago Police Department known as 'Special Investigations', liaising with a Lieutenant, later Detective-Sergeant, Murphy."

"Like you and Lestrade," John said.

"Don't be ridiculous," Sherlock said dismissively. "Dresden was a private detective. He was paid."

John raised a sceptical eyebrow, then shrugged. "So, I'm guessing he wasn't your average charlatan," he said.

"Definitely not," Sherlock said. "Very few charlatans actually believe their own hype and those that do are rarely very rational and therefore not very good investigators. Yet he does seem to have genuinely believed it and repeated hire suggests repeated success, considerable success."

"Not blackmail?"

"No blackmailer with sufficient information to extort a major metropolitan police force for over a decade would limit themselves to simply cornering the market on consulting on unusual investigations," Sherlock said dismissively.

"You might," John said.

Sherlock paused, then looked thoughtful, as if actually considering this notion. Then, he shook his head and returned his gaze to the board. "No," he said. "Blackmail is boring."

"Then what's so interesting about him?" John asked. "From what you've said so far, he could just be a very good private investigator who happened to believe that he could do magic. I mean, I'm not a psychiatrist or a paediatrician, but if his father was a magician and died at a formative age..."

"Good thinking and on another occasion, I might have agreed with you," Sherlock said.

"You would?"

"Of course, child raised by a single father who performs tricks designed to appear impossible and thereby deceive the unobservant, the two travel regularly so that the father is the only constant in the child's life then he suddenly dies, from the point of view of a child, vanishing," Sherlock said. "The child then copes with grief by a form of self-delusion, that his father was actually a wizard and perhaps simply went away, thereby fostering his own belief that he is a wizard. All elementary."

"But," John said. "There's a but, isn't there?"

"Yes. Dresden has left a trail of death and destruction wherever he has gone, including an unusual incident involving Elaine Mallory, working as a private investigator and 'professional wizard' in LA over ten years after her supposed death."

"So, wait, his foster-sister _didn't_ die?"

"Apparently not. She was admitted to Cook County Hospital in Chicago three years ago by a known associate of Dresden's, with wounds to the wrist and levels of blood loss consistent with a suicide attempt, wounds to the feet consistent with someone who had walked barefoot over rubble - unsurprising, since her motel room apparently exploded."

"Exploded?!"

"Apparently," Sherlock said, sounding both intrigued and annoyed, as if fascinated by the challenge before him and frustrated by being unable to immediately puzzle it out. 

"Hang on, so she was committing suicide, and then someone tried to _blow her up?_ " John asked, baffled.

"Unlikely, considering that the blast destroyed her room's outside wall."

John frowned. "You could rig a bomb to do it," he said. "But it wouldn't be your average home-made explosive. You'd need military hardware, and an expert to handle it. Frankly, I can't see why anyone would bother - anyone trying to help her would have no reason to blow her room up, and anyone trying to kill her wouldn't have any reason to bother, considering she was killing herself already."

Sherlock regarded him for a moment, a hint of approval in his expression. "You would think so, wouldn't you?" he said. "But that's just a footnote." 

This, John felt, spoke volumes of how strange this particular case was. Before today, a mystery like that would have kept Sherlock fascinated for at least a day or two - perhaps more, given that he didn't have access to the crime scene.

"Dresden's office building was bombed - later examination found that the explosives were packed around his office in particular. This was followed by an attack on the FBI's Chicago headquarters after he was brought in for questioning, and then his assassination the next day. An assassination performed with a high calibre hunting rifle from a distance of at least 800 yards."

John let out a slow breath. While a lot of this was baffling and downright abstract to him, this was more familiar territory. He hadn't been a sniper himself, but he'd met a few, working with several of them. And from what he'd seen and what they'd said, that was not the sort of range an amateur would try their luck from, let alone make a perfect kill.

"Someone seems to have really wanted him dead," he said.

"Obviously," Sherlock said dismissively, the approval long gone. "Furthermore, as soon as he disappears, Chicago is afflicted by a new form of gang warfare and two serial killing vigilantes appear that are assumed to be one and the same, and both as a result are referred to as the Rag Lady for their habit of leaving scraps of cloth at the scene of each murder, scraps identified as having come from Dresden's signature black duster."

"Definitely not your average charlatan, then," John said mildly.

"Oh, it gets better," Sherlock said. "Because a matter of weeks ago, Harry Dresden came back from the dead."

John paused and thought this through. "You mean, rose from the grave?" he asked.

"No, of course not," Sherlock said impatiently. "There is a grave with his name on it, but the plot is still open. As it has been for over ten years, for some reason."

"Which suggests that the body was never found after he was shot," John said, then added pointedly, "which also suggests that he might never have died in the first place."

Sherlock gave him his patented 'how do you survive with so small a brain' look, then picked up a file, flipped through it, and handed it over. "What's this?"

"The report," Sherlock said, conveniently eliding how he’d managed to get hold of it. John suspected that either Mycroft had decided that Sherlock was getting bored and had given him something to distract him for fear of the potential consequences, or just more evidence of Sherlock’s inexplicable capacity to get hold of things he shouldn’t possibly be able to. "Read it and tell me if you think anyone could survive that before they fell into the waters of Lake Michigan during the evening, with an approximate water temperature of six degrees Celsius, before then swimming to shore and disappearing without leaving a trail of any kind."

John's eyes skimmed over it. He had to concede that Sherlock had a point. The trajectory of the bullet suggested a shot high in the torso, in turn confirming his suspicion that it had been made by a marksman who knew their business. With that, the amount of blood lost and the temperature of the lake, even if Dresden had survived that, he would have gone into shock immediately after hitting the water.

"So," Sherlock said. "A self-proclaimed wizard and private detective who takes on the most minor of private commissions for limited fees, yet is also closely associated with both the Chicago underworld and the police, who survived one assassination attempt only to be killed the very next day, something which then sparked a gang war, and then he somehow came back to life a year later." He grinned, sudden and all the more startling for its sincere eagerness. "Why am I interested, John?" he asked. "Why wouldn't I be?"


End file.
